I have to admit, I had a whole bunch of U words floating around in my head for doing this post on U... uplifting, usurping, uttering (dictation), Ursa (a space post), and such like but couldn't (through the fog of a migraine) figure out what to write on, and then this morning, I read this post about Unschooling and it brought back to mind the struggles I have mentally with this form of schooling.

I know people who chose to unschool their children, I KNOW that it means different things to different people...but the ones that act like true unschoolers say two things.1. you have to trust your children to learn what they are supposed to learn to get along in life.2. you don't need to teach your children anything unless they want to learn it.I struggle with that.You see my boy? He is an inquisitive, animal focused, artistic type of lad. He is both very stubborn and very soft. I can quell him with a look or a raised voice (even if the voice is not raised in anger). He is very articulate and knows well his own mind. And he is only eight.1. Trust your children.How do I do that? And if I do that...what am I teaching my son.if I trust him to manage his own schooling and learning what am I teaching him truly?I fear that I would teach him that1. his interests are more important than mine2. his interests and my need to trust him are more important than God.You see God says "train up a child in the way he should go". It doesn't say trust your child to know what's important and what he should learn, but to train him up. So how does Train him up fit within that paradigm of trusting your child?2. Don't teach your child something that don't want to learnMy son dislikes learning math. I am not sure why...as when he was a child he could do math easily in his head and liked to show off his prowess with that. But now, getting him to do simple math (math he used to do in his head) is sometimes a challenge. So I really don't know what is up with that. Does that mean then that I should just ignore math? I don't think so. Math is a fundamental part of our lives...it is used on a daily basis. But then I look at math and the need (if unschooling) to trust your children to learn what they must learn and I apply that to the bigger picture..Do children want to learn how to be obedient to their parents and more importantly to the Lord? Not generally. The bible is clear that we are all full of sin and inclined to go our own way. It shows time again how people who love God dearly still will often seek their own paths and not God. So if I teach my boy that he only needs to learn what he wants to learn what am i ultimately teaching him? I think that is the question that people really need to answer.What do you want to ultimately teach your children?

Now with all that said, does that mean I can't use his interests in our homeschooling?No!My son loves angry birds.... so why not use that in art and math?My son loves small critters... so we can use that to do math, art, history, science, geography and so much more.My son loves building with duct tape... well duct tape weapons require reading, history, math and just so much more.I can use his interests to build up interests in other areas, to spark his creative juices and his willingness to tell me things that he has learned.It's means that when we do bible study I try to incorporate some form of art with it. Most recently we are building a word plaque/wall hanging with the names of Christ on it. This spurs his creative juices and we learn together. It's a good thing that.

So we need to understand what we are doing when we teach our children. I can't say I have it all down pat as I really honestly don't. But i'm thinking that I'm starting to get a better grip on why some forms of schooling (or not schooling) cause me to feel alarmed inside, particularly when folks who are believers tell me that they are considering doing this in their schooling. How do you approach your schooling?

I agree - you have to have a really motivated kid to truly unschool, I think. Mine is not. We are pretty relaxed, I think, and definitely eclectic. We use some unschooling ideas (letting kiddo decide on/explore non-core subjects) but we are definitely not true unschoolers.

annette @ A net in Time

2/26/2014 04:56:26 am

yes, some unschooling does happen, I know the lad learns much through play particularly imaginative play, so I encourage that sort of thing. :) But I will admit to being fairly eclectic in our schooling. :)